The treatment of intraoral conditions typically involves pain or discomfort. Since the earliest days of anesthesia, attempts have been made to minimize pain or discomfort during medical and dental procedures, including intraoral-procedures.
For purposes of this invention, "intraoral-procedures" means health care manipulations by a health care practitioner done inside the oral cavity of a mammalian patient. Nonlimiting examples of intraoral-procedures include periodontal procedures, dental procedures, oral surgery, and orthodontia.
Typically, injections of local anesthetics are employed intraorally for temporary anesthesia. But these invasive procedures produce discomfort and cause high anxiety levels in patients. There is also a delay inherent between the injection and the onset of anesthesia.
Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) has been employed as a method to reduce pain or discomfort for mammalian patients. Typically, the application of a low voltage, low current electrical signal through the skin counteracts nerve stimulation indicating pain or discomfort.
TENS biomedical electrodes are well known but have not previously been widely applied to intraoral-procedures. None of the TENS biomedical electrodes for intraoral-procedures were convenient to use because these electrodes were intended to stick to the soft intraoral tissue during the intraoral procedure, particularly while a cavity was being prepared and filled with restorative material. These electrodes frequently did not maintain adhesion to soft, moist tissue during these procedures in the crowded, irrigated, saliva-filled mouth. Further, saliva or irrigating fluids can drain current away from the tooth needing pain control. Another difficulty with these electrodes was the use of a splayed wire as the electrical conductor contacting the conductive adhesive in the electrode. This splayed wire could cause unacceptably high current densities.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,782,837 (Hogan) discloses a dental analgesia method and apparatus where one TENS electrode is applied to the hand and another TENS electrode is applied to the face.
TENS biomedical electrodes have employed a delivery path for electrical signals that emphasizes the surface area of the field of conductive adhesive being greater than the surface of the electrical conductor delivering the electrical signals to the field of conductive adhesive. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,694,835 and 4,458,696 disclose TENS electrodes where perimeter dimensions of pad portions of electrical conductors are within perimeter dimensions of contiguous fields of conductive adhesives.
Thus, the present intraoral medical practices have not found a solution to a comfortable and quick administration of anesthesia.